In its continued efforts to cut costs, British Telecommunications PLC (BT) will close 53 of its call centres and eliminate 2,200 jobs, a company spokesman said March 26.
“This is not a new-jobs announcement. Rather, it’s a new detail to the reorganization of our customer services operations,” said BT spokesman Mike Bartlett.
The eliminated call centres
will be replaced with 30 “customer contact centres ” that will take advantage of “state of the art technology,” Bartlett said. Details of the new technology were not immediately available.
“With the way that technology has changed, it is perfectly reasonable to close some centres and upgrade others. Customers will experience no change in current levels of service. In fact, when the new centres
are completed in the next two years, customers should find service to be even better,” Bartlett said.
As part of the restructuring, two-thirds of current employees will be moved to new buildings. About 103 call centres
will remain, employing about 13,600 people, Bartlett said. The London-based company will be closing call centres located in various parts of the U.K., he said.